Ok... let's face it; the story you guys wrote in this thread was utter shite last time around. Absolutely impossible to follow and entirely horrid. I've removed it and we need to start over.

I think my rules were part of the problem last time around. They were too restrictive and caused posters to overindulge with each post. The rules are now quite relaxed, so stop that.

Let's begin again.

The purpose of this thread is to write a novel, one user and one post at a time. Here are the rules:

1) Try to build upon what was written before you rather than needlessly injecting random non sequiturs for fun. Remember, someone will one day read this work in its entirety. Try not to turn it into a scatterbrained suck-fest.

2) Only 4 sentences per post in this thread.

3) You may post twice per day in this thread.

4) No references to George Noory, Premiere Radio, Coast to Coast AM, Art Bell, or ANY of that universe. Pretend, for the purposes of this work, you know nothing about any of that. Please. Fucking please.

5) Only post in this thread if you are adding to the novel. All other posts will be deleted.

Matt sat on the broken stones that were once part of the public library down on Elm Street next to his favorite coffee shop. Having stocked his backpack with necessities along with a set of knives and unbelievable luck in finding two Glocks - a 19 and 27 - he needed time to assess his options. His dust laden cargo pants, dirty flannel shirt and jacket would be effective in blending in with the rubble that once was a city. Rubbing the stubble on his chin he considered his chances in the open heading back to the lab at the university in hope that some of his colleagues and Megan would still be as safe as one could reasonably expect after the event that changed everything.

It would be dark soon. If he waited too much longer, he might as well stay the night and perform a second sift through the coffeehouse for more supplies. Maybe the rats would be less aggressive this time.

Just two days ago the small Midwestern university city of Kelsey was going about its daily routine when Matt entered The Dusty Shelf, a bookstore that contained hard to find manuscripts dealing with metaphysics and prophecy. Matt found a very old manuscript about the end times that predated even Nostradamus. After the purchase, he reflected on this day, their first anniversary since meeting in the faculty lounge the previous fall. Enjoying that dark Peruvian brew and roll seemed so long ago now as he shook his head and refocused his thoughts to dealing with finding anything more in those shops as the shadows grew longer while twilight moved into darkness.

Upon hearing the commotion, Matt decided that having gained the weapons and ammunition he should think about moving his way down the street and see if anything further could be gained at that corner drug store he caught sight of.

While his primary motivation for heading back was Megan, his sister Jessica had arrived yesterday and he hoped that Jessie, along with Gentry and Ramesh were all smart enough to remain at the most secure location on campus.

Again, after arriving and rummaging through the disorder at the drug store, a small bit of good fortune smiled on him as he gathered most of the remaining medicinals, ointments and basic first aid scraps strewn among the aisles along with two boxes of unopened batteries found in the electronics section of the store.

With increasing nervousness he turned on a pen light to navigate his way out from the clutter to the untracked open sliding doors with an additional stuffed duffle bag realizing he'd have to make it back to the university with the half moon as his sole source of light.

The night was partly cloudy and the gentle autumn breeze occasionally rustled some leaves as Matt moved out of the small downtown area.

Checking for keys and trying to start a few cars, Matt wished that the vehicles he encountered hadn't all been fried by the EMP resulting from the nuclear detonation in the nearby port city of Eureka.

"Oh! Thank God", mumbled Matt as he eyed a bicycle with a working headlamp lying on the sidewalk near an intersection.

He immediately secured the duffel bag using the bag's loop handles through the bicycle's handle bars and began peddling, his eyes continually moving from left to right scanning for any unexpected surprises.

The event occurred on the Saturday morning prior to Thanksgiving and practically all of the students and residents had left to visit family elsewhere for the week long fall break.

In the secure lab, Dr. Gentry Reynolds stared at the water as it heated in the beaker troubled by something that seemed very odd in that no sirens or any kind of alert had occurred.

At no time anywhere on earth had any early warning sirens been heard, no launch silos readied or other type of heightened military preparedness. There had been no reporting on any of the major networks or radio about any critical international tension taking place other than the usual prepared speeches for the press given by leaders across the globe.

Ramesh, coming over to sit by the pensive Gentry, a bag of tea in his cup, mentioned that he had his call back home to India interrupted just a few seconds or so before the flash indicating that Eureka had been hit. It seemed highly unusual that two locations half way around the world from one another would experience the same event at virtually the same time.

Tuning in the Emergency Broadcast System they found that satellite communications and broadcasting in Chicago and St. Louis both went down six seconds apart along with Eureka and the major west coast cities all went down ten seconds before Chicago.

For such a massive attack to occur without our defenses even aware of a missile launch from foreign soil suggested that the attack was initiated from space itself rather than from a terrestrial location.

With all the sophisticated electronic communications knocked as a result of the electromagnetic pulses, military and HAM operators were the first to resort to using Morse code to reestablish communications as best they could. It would take time for questions to be asked and what would have to pass for answers to be received. As soon as persons around the world sufficiently recovered from the shock, a rudimentary network would begin to form and the shared information would be used to rebuild local areas into more cohesive communities and eventually link up with others. The up and coming winter was going to be a challenge rivaling that of early man facing nature’s fury as the loss of power would be a severe test for humanity.

Fortunately for Matt and those he anxiously headed back to be with the campus had been upwind so the ash dusting fallout was minimal.

He was startled as the bark of a dog grew louder as he came upon three people huddled around a small campfire not far off the road. An older man stood and shouted, “Gizmo, come here boy” as the dog headed back to the gathering. A younger woman and what appeared to be a child of about nine or ten rose and waved Matt over. Matt realized he wouldn’t be able to get away from them if they had a gun ready as Matt, realizing his mistake in that his weapons were secured in his backpack.

Cautiously he slowed down as the woman asked him, “Would you like a cup of coffee and something to eat?” Was it just to get him over there to steal what he was carrying or was it a genuine invite? “Yes, I am armed but I’m not interested in anything but working with others. We’ve got what we need”, the middle aged man said as he could read Matt’s concern. It turned out that the young lady and her daughter had decided to head down to Kelsey from Minnesota to spend Thanksgiving with her recently retired father, a military man.

This whole thing just wasn’t right. Matt swooned, shook his head to clear it. ”Scatter-brained mother-fuck-bull-shit from a bad post-apocalyptic Phillip K. Dick novel!” he howled to no one in particular. God, how he hated when this happened. Wearily he pulled both glocks from the waist band behind his back and aimed at the heads of the mother and daughter…or rather at the huge, blue veined symbiotic rats sucking greedily at the napes of both their necks.

"Matthew Edgar Ipock, put down them Glock 19s before Mishika busts a cap in yo' sorry white ass," said Jaquesius Fowler as she reached up for the animal on her shoulder."But, but the rat," said Matt."Ain't no rat city boy - it's a possum and it's gone be our evening meal - get yo' ass over there cutting firewood.""You got him feeling salty, Mama," said Mishika lowering her piece, "but he's the only one left."

Gizmo trotted back from the fire and nonchalantly pissed on the open-toed sandal of Mishika’s left foot. Matt noticed a weird tilt-a-whirl feeling in his stomach as his reality started shifting again. Something about this whole environment was shaky and toxic…making him prone to hallucinate. Could it be the EMP? He could feel a mix of vomit and bile bulging its way up past his epiglottis…He was sweating and starting to babble again: ”Where the fuck is Megan?... Rodents or marsupials…Neither are good eating, right? Wasn’t Eureka a television show on basic cable…?” Moving colors started to over take him as he puked violently near Mishika’s only dry foot…

....... his eyes are beckoned from his journal to the window by a gentle call of light. He rises and steps closer to the window and peers toward the heavens, his eyes capture the sight of a mesmerizing dance of colour and shape. It's the aurora created by the detonation of a nuclear weapon high in the atmosphere, as the Earths magnetic fields move these energetic particles towards her poles, light is produced in colours that blankets the spectrum. It is easily seen well due to the lack of light pollution and are visible long after the EMP has passed, little did Matt know, but the same spectacle was displaying itself on the other side of the world.

....... his eyes are beckoned from his journal to the window by a gentle call of light. He rises and steps closer to the window and peers toward the heavens, his eyes capture the sight of a mesmerizing dance of colour and shape. It's the aurora created by the detonation of a nuclear weapon high in the atmosphere, as the Earths magnetic fields move these energetic particles towards her poles, light is produced in colours that blankets the spectrum. It is easily seen well due to the lack of light pollution and are visible long after the EMP has passed, little did Matt know, but the same spectacle was displaying itself on the other side of the world.

Katrina heard the birds by the window, but today they stopped earlier than usual. Searching her memories from the night before... a shot, then more. A das vadanya and she was in the taxi and stumbling up to her flat. At least she managed to get her heels off before landing on the bed with the down featherbed accomodating her appraoch and landing and caressing her shapely figure to hold her safe through the night.

Wiping the sand from her eye, wondering who poured sand in her mouth, she reached for yesterday’s water glass to bring herself to the brink of consciousness. Blink. Blink. What day is today? Reaching for her phone she notices that it has no power. Where did Dmitri leave that power adapter?

The drapes were doing their job holding back the rush of the dawn sky. Katrina summons all her strength to roll over and turn on the lamp on the bedstand. No light. That is strange. Ever since her mother passed and she inherited the antique lamp, that bulb has always worked. One of the few remnants of a Soviet industrial machine that might not have studied pleasing designs, but even the light bulbs were built like tanks.

Time to find some espresso and look for another lightbulb and that damned phone charger.

Katrina heard the birds by the window, but today they stopped earlier than usual. Searching her memories from the night before... a shot, then more. A das vadanya and she was in the taxi and stumbling up to her flat. At least she managed to get her heels off before landing on the bed with the down featherbed accomodating her appraoch and landing and caressing her shapely figure to hold her safe through the night.

Wiping the sand from her eye, wondering who poured sand in her mouth, she reached for yesterday’s water glass to bring herself to the brink of consciousness. Blink. Blink. What day is today? Reaching for her phone she notices that it has no power. Where did Dmitri leave that power adapter?

The drapes were doing their job holding back the rush of the dawn sky. Katrina summons all her strength to roll over and turn on the lamp on the bedstand. No light. That is strange. Ever since her mother passed and she inherited the antique lamp, that bulb has always worked. One of the few remnants of a Soviet industrial machine that might not have studied pleasing designs, but even the light bulbs were built like tanks.

Time to find some espresso and look for another lightbulb and that damned phone charger.

...

The power was out, and she didnt want to mess with making coffee with the gas stove, so Katrina took a cold press espresso out of the fridge. She noticed a few other bottles left, clammy with condensation, as half her mind harkened back on how to make her brew on the stove.

Without a phone for emergencies, she made sure her whistle and personal protective devices were on her. She looked hard out the windows and building hallway, realizing the people and animals nearby were the only worldly information source she had.

realizing the people and animals nearby were the only worldly information source she had.

"Speak to animals?, Oh, shit." Katrina raced to the medicine cabinet. She grabbed her bottle of Olanzapine and shook out her last pill. Popping it into her mouth and bending over to drink water from the bathroom faucet she made a note that she needed to call her psychiatrist this morning to have her antipsychotic prescription refilled. Her schizophrenia had been under control for several years now, and she had no desire to see all those years of stability flushed down the drain. She turned off the bathroom sink and went back to the kitchen.

"Speak to animals?, Oh, shit." Katrina raced to the medicine cabinet. She grabbed her bottle of Olanzapine and shook out her last pill. Popping it into her mouth and bending over to drink water from the bathroom faucet she made a note that she needed to call her psychiatrist this morning to have her antipsychotic prescription refilled. Her schizophrenia had been under control for several years now, and she had no desire to see all those years of stability flushed down the drain. She turned off the bathroom sink and went back to the kitchen.

Yet somehow she didn't get the prescription refilled the next day, nor even the day after. Eventually the prescription was refilled and upon picking up the anti-psychotic medication, Katrina thought to herself "Who are they to try and fix me?". In a moment of inspiration, she fed one of the pills to her pet bird. The bird gobbled the pill up with obvious relish. Soon the bird began to talk to Katrina. This was not happy "Polly want cracker" talk but rather deep, dark, foreboding, talk. The bird said things that no bird should say............

Yet somehow she didn't get the prescription refilled the next day, nor even the day after. Eventually the prescription was refilled and upon picking up the anti-psychotic medication, Katrina thought to herself "Who are they to try and fix me?". In a moment of inspiration, she fed one of the pills to her pet bird. The bird gobbled the pill up with obvious relish. Soon the bird began to talk to Katrina. This was not happy "Polly want cracker" talk but rather deep, dark, foreboding, talk. The bird said things that no bird should say............

Katrina heard the birds by the window, but today they stopped earlier than usual. Searching her memories from the night before... a shot, then more. A das vadanya and she was in the taxi and stumbling up to her flat. At least she managed to get her heels off before landing on the bed with the down featherbed accomodating her appraoch and landing and caressing her shapely figure to hold her safe through the night.

Wiping the sand from her eye, wondering who poured sand in her mouth, she reached for yesterday’s water glass to bring herself to the brink of consciousness. Blink. Blink. What day is today? Reaching for her phone she notices that it has no power. Where did Dmitri leave that power adapter?

The drapes were doing their job holding back the rush of the dawn sky. Katrina summons all her strength to roll over and turn on the lamp on the bedstand. No light. That is strange. Ever since her mother passed and she inherited the antique lamp, that bulb has always worked. One of the few remnants of a Soviet industrial machine that might not have studied pleasing designs, but even the light bulbs were built like tanks.

Time to find some espresso and look for another lightbulb and that damned phone charger.

Yet somehow she didn't get the prescription refilled the next day, nor even the day after. Eventually the prescription was refilled and upon picking up the anti-psychotic medication, Katrina thought to herself "Who are they to try and fix me?". In a moment of inspiration, she fed one of the pills to her pet bird. The bird gobbled the pill up with obvious relish. Soon the bird began to talk to Katrina. This was not happy "Polly want cracker" talk but rather deep, dark, foreboding, talk. The bird said things that no bird should say............

Katrina was transfixed. "Kill them, kill them all" the bird repeated over and over. "Kill them, kill them all" Katrina repeated back, over and over, each repetition becoming slower and more robotic sounding. She hadn't seen another human in days. She ate little, and slept even less. The apartment was cold, ice was beginning to form on the windows.

She went to Dimitri's toolbox and pulled out the largest wrench he had. She walked to the front door, thinking nothing, feeling nothing. When she entered the hallway the stench of death broke her out of her catatonic state.

Katrina was transfixed. "Kill them, kill them all" the bird repeated over and over. "Kill them, kill them all" Katrina repeated back, over and over, each repetition becoming slower and more robotic sounding. She hadn't seen another human in days. She ate little, and slept even less. The apartment was cold, ice was beginning to form on the windows.

She went to Dimitri's toolbox and pulled out the largest wrench he had. She walked to the front door, thinking nothing, feeling nothing. When she entered the hallway the stench of death broke her out of her catatonic state.

In a way, she was glad to back inside again and shut the door while she mentally prepared herself. The stench snapped her back to reality, out of the psychotic side effects backlash of her prescription. She reflected back on recent neighborhood sounds which might give her a clue as to any recent, nearby tragedy which could result in the stench. She remembered every dog in the neighborhood barking incessantly over something on Friday night, and that her bird had parroted the ensuing sirens.